The Life of William Carey, Shoemaker & Missionary
by
George Smith

Part 3 out of 8



Satan. Brother Brunsdon can talk a little, though not like
Marshman. Brother Ward is a great prize; he does not learn the
language so quickly, but he is so holy, so spiritual a man, and so
useful among the children."

Thus early did Carey note the value of Hannah Marshman, the first
woman missionary to India. Granddaughter of the Baptist minister of
Crockerton in Wiltshire, she proved to be for forty-six years at
once a loving wife, and the equal of the three missionaries of
Christ and of civilisation whom she aided in the common home, in the
schools, in the congregation, in the Native Christian families, and
even, at that early time, in purely Hindoo circles. Without her the
mission must have been one-sided indeed. It gives us a pathetic
interest to turn to her household books, where we find entered with
loving care and thoughtful thrift all the daily details which at
once form a valuable contribution to the history of prices, and show
how her "prudence" combined with the heroic self-denial of all to
make the Serampore mission the light of India. Ward's journal
supplies this first sketch of the brotherhood, who realised, more
than probably any in Protestant, Romanist, or Greek hagiology, the
life of the apostolic community in Jerusalem:--

"January 18, 1800.--This week we have adopted a set of rules for the
government of the family. All preach and pray in turn; one
superintends the affairs of the family for a month, and then
another; brother Carey is treasurer, and has the regulation of the
medicine chest; brother Fountain is librarian. Saturday evening is
devoted to adjusting differences, and pledging ourselves to love one
another. One of our resolutions is, that no one of us do engage in
private trade; but that all be done for the benefit of the
mission...

"August 1.--Our labours for every day are now regularly arranged.
About six o'clock we rise; brother Carey to his garden; brother
Marshman to his school at seven; brother Brunsdon, Felix, and I, to
the printing-office. At eight the bell rings for family worship: we
assemble in the hall; sing, read, and pray. Breakfast. Afterwards,
brother Carey goes to the translation, or reading proofs: brother
Marshman to school, and the rest to the printing-office. Our
compositor having left us, we do without: we print three half-sheets
of 2000 each in a week; have five pressmen, one folder, and one
binder. At twelve o'clock we take a luncheon; then most of us shave
and bathe, read and sleep before dinner, which we have at three.
After dinner we deliver our thoughts on a text or question: this we
find to be very profitable. Brother and sister Marshman keep their
schools till after two. In the afternoon, if business be done in
the office, I read and try to talk Bengali with the bràmmhàn. We
drink tea about seven, and have little or no supper. We have
Bengali preaching once or twice in the week, and on Thursday evening
we have an experience meeting. On Saturday evening we meet to
compose differences and transact business, after prayer, which is
always immediately after tea. Felix is very useful in the office;
William goes to school, and part of the day learns to bind. We meet
two hours before breakfast on the first Monday in the month, and
each one prays for the salvation of the Bengal heathen. At night we
unite our prayers for the universal spread of the Gospel."

The "Form of Agreement" which regulated the social economy and
spiritual enterprise of the brotherhood, and also its legal
relations to the Baptist Society in England, deserves study, in its
divine disinterestedness, its lofty aims, and its kindly common
sense. Fuller had pledged the Society in 1798 to send out £360 a
year for the joint family of six missionaries, their wives, and
children. The house and land at Serampore cost the Society Rs.6000.
On Grant's death, leaving a widow and two children, the five
missionaries made the first voluntary agreement, which "provided
that no one should trade on his own private account, and that the
product of their labour should form a common fund to be applied at
the will of the majority, to the support of their respective
families, of the cause of God around them, and of the widow and
family of such as might be removed by death." The first year the
schools and the press enabled the brotherhood to be more than
self-supporting. In the second year Carey's salary from the College
of Fort-William, and the growth of the schools and press, gave them
a surplus for mission extension. They not only paid for the
additional two houses and ground required by such extension, but
they paid back to the Society all that it had advanced for the first
purchase in the course of the next six years. They acquired all the
property for the Serampore Mission, duly informing the home
Committee from time to time, and they vested the whole right, up to
Fuller's death in 1815, in the Society, "to prevent the premises
being sold or becoming private property in the families." But "to
secure their own quiet occupation of them, and enable them to leave
them in the hands of such as they might associate with themselves in
their work, they declared themselves trustees instead of
proprietors."

The agreement of 1800 was expanded into the "Form of Agreement" of
1805 when the spiritual side of the mission had grown. Their own
authoritative statement, as given above, was lovingly recognised by
Fuller. In 1817, and again in 1820, the claims of aged and
destitute relatives, and the duty of each brother making provision
for his own widow and orphans, and, occasionally, the calls of pity
and humanity, led the brotherhood to agree that "each shall
regularly deduct a tenth of the net product of his labour to form a
fund in his own hands for these purposes." We know nothing in the
history of missions, monastic or evangelical, which at all
approaches this in administrative perfectness as well is in
Christlike self-sacrifice. It prevents secularisation of spirit,
stimulates activity of all kinds, gives full scope to local ability
and experience, calls forth the maximum of local support and
propagation, sets the church at home free to enter incessantly on
new fields, provides permanence as well as variety of action and
adaptation to new circumstances, and binds the whole in a holy bond
of prayerful co-operation and loving brotherhood. This Agreement
worked for seventeen years, with a success in England and India
which we shall trace, or as long as Fuller, Ryland, and Sutcliff
lived "to hold the ropes," while Carey, Marshman, and Ward excavated
the mine of Hindooism.

The spiritual side of the Agreement we find in the form which the
three drew up in 1805, to be read publicly at all their stations
thrice every year, on the Lord's Day. It is the ripe fruit of the
first eleven years of Carey's daily toil and consecrated genius, as
written out by the fervent pen of Ward. In the light of it the whole
of Carey's life must be read. In these concluding sentences the
writer sketches Carey himself:--"Let us often look at Brainerd in
the woods of America, pouring out his very soul before God for the
perishing heathen, without whose salvation nothing could make you
happy. Prayer, secret, fervent, believing prayer, lies at the root
of all personal godliness. A competent knowledge of the languages
current where a missionary lives, a mild and winning temper, and a
heart given up to God in closet religion; these, these are the
attainments which more than all knowledge or all other gifts, will
fit us to become the instruments of God in the great work of human
redemption. Finally, let us give ourselves unreservedly to this
glorious cause. Let us never think that our time, our gifts, our
strength, our families, or even the clothes we wear are our own.
Let us sanctify them all to God and His cause. Oh! that He may
sanctify us for His work. Let us for ever shut out the idea of
laying up a cowrie (mite) for ourselves or our children. If we give
up the resolution which was formed on the subject of private trade,
when we first united at Serampore, the mission is from that hour a
lost cause. Let us continually watch against a worldly spirit, and
cultivate a Christian indifference towards every indulgence. Rather
let us bear hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ. No private
family ever enjoyed a greater portion of happiness, even in the most
prosperous gale of worldly prosperity, than we have done since we
resolved to have all things in common. If we are enabled to
persevere in the same principles, we may hope that multitudes of
converted souls will have reason to bless God to all eternity for
sending His Gospel into this country."

Such was the moral heroism, such the spiritual aim of the Serampore
brotherhood; how did it set to work?





CHAPTER VI

THE FIRST NATIVE CONVERTS AND CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS

1800-1810

A carpenter the first Bengali convert--Krishna Pal's
confession--Caste broken for the first time--Carey describes the
baptism in the Hoogli--The first woman convert--The first widow
convert--The first convert of writer caste--The first Christian
Brahman--The first native chapel--A Bengali "experience"
meeting--Carey founding a new community as well as church--Marriage
difficulties solved--The first native Christian marriage feast in
North India--Hindoo Christian death and burial--The first Christian
schools and school-books in North India--The first native Sunday
school--Boarding schools for the higher education of country-born
Christians--Carey on the mixed Portuguese, Eurasians, and
Armenians--The Benevolent Institution for destitute children of all
races--A hundred schools--English only postponed--Effect on native
opinion and action--The leaven of the Kingdom--The Mission breaks
forth into five at the close of 1810.

For seven years Carey had daily preached Christ in Bengali without a
convert. He had produced the first edition of the New Testament.
He had reduced the language to literary form. He had laid the
foundations in the darkness of the pit of Hindooism, while the
Northamptonshire pastors, by prayer and self-sacrifice, held the
ropes. The last disappointment was on 25th November 1800, when "the
first Hindoo" catechumen, Fakeer, offered himself for baptism,
returned to his distant home for his child, and appeared no more,
probably "detained by force." But on the last Sunday of that year
Krishna Pal was baptised in the Hoogli and his whole family soon
followed him. He was thirty-five years of age. Not only as the
first native Christian of North India of whom we have a reliable
account, but as the first missionary to Calcutta and Assam, and the
first Bengali hymn-writer, this man deserves study.

Carey's first Hindoo convert was three years younger than himself,
or about thirty-six, at baptism. Krishna Pal, born in the
neighbouring French settlement of Chandernagore, had settled in the
suburbs of Serampore, where he worked as a carpenter. Sore sickness
and a sense of sin led him to join the Kharta-bhojas, one of the
sects which, from the time of Gautama Buddha, and of Chaitanya, the
reformer of Nuddea, to that of Nanak, founder of the Sikh
brotherhood have been driven into dissent by the yoke of Brahmanism.
Generally worshippers of some form of Vishnoo, and occasionally, as
in Kabeer's case, influenced by the monotheism of Islam, these sects
begin by professing theism and opposition to caste, though Hindooism
is elastic enough to keep them always within its pale and ultimately
to absorb them again. For sixteen years Krishna Pal was himself a
gooroo of the Ghospara sect, of which from Carey's to Duff's earlier
days the missionaries had a hope which proved vain. He recovered
from sickness, but could not shake off the sense of the burden of
sin, when this message came to him, and, to his surprise, through
the Europeans--"Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners."
At the same time he happened to dislocate his right arm by falling
down the slippery side of his tank when about to bathe. He sent two
of the children to the Mission House for Thomas, who immediately
left the breakfast table at which the brethren had just sat down,
and soon reduced the luxation, while the sufferer again heard the
good news that Christ was waiting to heal his soul, and he and his
neighbour Gokool received a Bengali tract. He himself thus told the
story:--"In this paper I read that he who confesseth and forsaketh
his sins, and trusteth in the righteousness of Christ, obtains
salvation. The next morning Mr. Carey came to see me, and after
inquiring how I was, told me to come to his house, that he would
give me some medicine, by which, through the blessing of God, the
pain in my arm would be removed. I went and obtained the medicine,
and through the mercy of God my arm was cured. From this time I
made a practice of calling at the mission house, where Mr. Ward and
Mr. Felix Carey used to read and expound the Holy Bible to me. One
day Dr. Thomas asked me whether I understood what I heard from Mr.
Ward and Mr. Carey. I said I understood that the Lord Jesus Christ
gave his life up for the salvation of sinners, and that I believed
it, and so did my friend Gokool. Dr. T. said, 'Then I call you
brother--come and let us eat together in love.' At this time the
table was set for luncheon, and all the missionaries and their
wives, and I and Gokool, sat down and ate together."

The servants spread the news, most horrible to the people, that the
two Hindoos had "become Europeans," and they were assaulted on their
way home. Just thirty years after, in Calcutta, the first public
breach of caste by the young Brahman students of Duff raised a still
greater commotion, and resulted in the first converts there.
Krishna Pal and his wife, his wife's sister and his four daughters;
Gokool, his wife, and a widow of forty who lived beside them, formed
the first group of Christian Hindoos of caste in India north of
Madras. Two years after Krishna Pal sent to the Society this
confession of his faith. Literally translated, it is a record of
belief such as Paul himself might have written, illustrated by an
apostolic life of twenty-two years. The carpenter's confession and
dedication has, in the original, an exquisite tenderness, reflected
also in the hymn11 which he wrote for family worship:--

"SERAMPORE, 12th Oct. 1802.

"To the brethren of the church of our Saviour Jesus Christ, our
souls' beloved, my affectionately embracing representation. The
love of God, the gospel of Jesus Christ, was made known by holy
brother Thomas. In that day our minds were filled with joy. Then
judging, we understood that we were dwelling in darkness. Through
the door of manifestation we came to know that, sin confessing, sin
forsaking, Christ's righteousness embracing, salvation would be
obtained. By light springing up in the heart, we knew that sinners
becoming repentant, through the sufferings of Christ, obtain
salvation. In this rejoicing, and in Christ's love believing, I
obtained mercy. Now it is in my mind continually to dwell in the
love of Christ: this is the desire of my soul. Do you, holy people,
pour down love upon us, that as the chatookee we may be satisfied.12
I was the vilest of sinners: He hath saved me. Now this word I will
tell to the world. Going forth, I will proclaim the love of Christ
with rejoicing. To sinners I will say this word: Here sinner,
brother! Without Christ there is no help. Christ, the world to
save, gave his own soul! Such love was never heard: for enemies
Christ gave his own soul! Such compassion, where shall we get? For
the sake of saving sinners he forsook the happiness of heaven. I
will constantly stay near him. Being awakened by this news, I will
constantly dwell in the town of joy. In the Holy Spirit I will
live: yet in Christ's sorrow I will be sorrowful. I will dwell
along with happiness, continually meditating on this;--Christ will
save the world! In Christ not taking refuge, there is no other way
of life. I was indeed a sinner, praise not knowing.--This is the
representation of Christ's servant,

"KRISTNO."

Such is the first epistle of the Church of India. Thus the first
medical missionary had his reward; but the joy proved to be too much
for him. When Carey led Krishna and his own son Felix down into the
water of baptism the ravings of Thomas in the schoolhouse on the one
side, and of Mrs. Carey on the other, mingled with the strains of
the Bengali hymn of praise. The Mission Journal, written by Ward,
tells with graphic simplicity how caste as well as idol-worship was
overcome not only by the men but the women representatives of a race
whom, thirty years after, Macaulay described as destitute of
courage, independence, and veracity, and bold only in deceit.
Christ is changing all that.

"Nov. 27.--Krishna, the man whose arm was set, overtook Felix and
me, and said he would come to our house daily for instruction; for
that we had not only cured his arm, but brought him the news of
salvation...

"Dec. 5.--Yesterday evening Gokool and Krishna prayed in my room.
This morning Gokool called upon us, and told us that his wife and
two or three more of his family had left him on account of the
gospel. He had eaten of Krishna's rice, who being of another caste,
Gokool had lost his. Krishna says his wife and family are all
desirous of becoming Christians. They declare their willingness to
join us, and obey all our Saviour's commands. Gokool and his wife
had a long talk; but she continued determined, and is gone to her
relations.

"Dec. 6.--This morning brother Carey and I went to Krishna's house.
Everything was made very clean. The women sat within the house,
the children at the door, and Krishna and Gokool with brother Carey
and I in the court. The houses of the poor are only calculated for
sleeping in. Brother Carey talked; and the women appeared to have
learned more of the gospel than we expected. They declared for
Christ at once. This work was new, even to brother Carey. A whole
family desiring to hear the gospel, and declaring in favour of it!
Krishna's wife said she had received great joy from it.

"Lord's-day, Dec. 7.--This morning brother Carey went to Krishna's
house, and spoke to a yard full of people, who heard with great
attention though trembling with cold. Brother Brunsdon is very
poorly. Krishna's wife and her sister were to have been with us in
the evening; but the women have many scruples to sitting in the
company of Europeans. Some of them scarcely ever go out but to the
river; and if they meet a European run away. Sometimes when we have
begun to speak in a street, some one desires us to remove to a
little distance; for the women dare not come by us to fill their
jars at the river. We always obey...

"Dec. 11.--Gokool, Krishna, and family continue to seek after the
Word, and profess their entire willingness to join us. The women
seem to have learnt that sin is a dreadful thing, and to have
received joy in hearing of Jesus Christ. We see them all every day
almost. They live but half a mile from us. We think it right to
make many allowances for ignorance, and for a state of mind produced
by a corrupt superstition. We therefore cannot think of demanding
from them, previous to baptism, to more than a profession of
dependence on Christ, from a knowledge of their need of Him, and
submission to Him in all things. We now begin to talk of baptism.
Yesterday we fixed upon the spot, before our gate, in the river.
We begin to talk also of many other things concerning the discipled
natives. This evening Felix and I went to Gokool's house. Krishna
and his wife and a bràmmhàn were present. I said a little. Felix
read the four last chapters of John to them, and spoke also. We sat
down upon a piece of mat in the front of the house. (No chairs.) It
was very pleasant. To have natives who feel a little as we do
ourselves, is so new and different. The country itself seems to
wear a new aspect to me...

"Dec. 13.--This evening Felix and I went to see our friends Gokool
and Krishna. The latter was out. Gokool gave a pleasing account of
the state of his mind, and also of that of Krishna and his family.
While we were there, Gokool's gooroo (teacher) came for the first
time since his losing caste. Gokool refused to prostrate himself at
his feet while he should put his foot on his head; for which his
gooroo was displeased...

"Dec. 22.--This day Gokool and Krishna came to eat tiffin (what in
England is called luncheon) with us, and thus publicly threw away
their caste. Brethren Carey and Thomas went to prayer with the two
natives before they proceeded to this act. All our servants were
astonished: so many had said that nobody would ever mind Christ or
lose caste. Brother Thomas has waited fifteen years, and thrown
away much upon deceitful characters: brother Carey has waited till
hope of his own success has almost expired; and after all, God has
done it with perfect ease! Thus the door of faith is open to the
gentiles; who shall shut it? The chain of the caste is broken; who
shall mend it?"

Carey thus describes the baptism:--"Dec. 29.--Yesterday was a day of
great joy. I had the happiness to desecrate the Gunga, by baptising
the first Hindoo, viz. Krishna, and my son Felix: some circumstances
turned up to delay the baptism of Gokool and the two women.
Krishna's coming forward alone, however, gave us very great
pleasure, and his joy at both ordinances was very great. The river
runs just before our gate, in front of the house, and, I think, is
as wide as the Thames at Gravesend. We intended to have baptised at
nine in the morning; but, on account of the tide, were obliged to
defer it till nearly one o'clock, and it was administered just after
the English preaching. The Governor and a good number of Europeans
were present. Brother Ward preached a sermon in English, from John
v. 39--'Search the Scriptures.' We then went to the water-side,
where I addressed the people in Bengali; after having sung a Bengali
translation of 'Jesus, and shall it ever be?' and engaging in
prayer. After the address I administered the ordinance, first to my
son, then to Krishna. At half-past four I administered the Lord's
Supper; and a time of real refreshing it was...

"Thus, you see, God is making way for us, and giving success to the
word of His grace! We have toiled long, and have met with many
discouragements; but, at last, the Lord has appeared for us. May we
have the true spirit of nurses, to train them up in the words of
faith and sound doctrine! I have no fear of any one, however, in
this respect, but myself. I feel much concerned that they may act
worthy of their vocation, and also that they may be able to teach
others. I think it becomes us to make the most of every one whom
the Lord gives us."

Jeymooni, Krishna's wife's sister, was the first Bengali woman to be
baptised, and Rasoo, his wife, soon followed; both were about
thirty-five years old. The former said she had found a treasure in
Christ greater than anything in the world. The latter, when she
first heard the good news from her husband, said "there was no such
sinner as I, and I felt my heart immediately unite to Him. I wish to
keep all His commands so far as I know them." Gokool was kept back
for a time by his wife, Komal, who fled to her father's, but Krishna
and his family brought in, first the husband, then the wife, whose
simplicity and frankness attracted the missionaries. Unna, their
widowed friend of forty, was also gathered in, the first of that sad
host of victims to Brahmanical cruelty, lust, and avarice, to whom
Christianity has ever since offered the only deliverance. Of
124,000,000 of women in India in 1881, no fewer than 21,000,000 were
returned by the census as widows, of whom 669,000 were under
nineteen years, 286,000 were under fifteen, and 79,000 were under
nine, all figures undoubtedly within the appalling truth. Jeymooni
and Unna at once became active missionaries among their
country-women, not only in Serampore but in Chandernagore and the
surrounding country.

The year 1800 did not close without fruit from the other and higher
castes. Petumber Singh, a man of fifty of the writer caste, had
sought deliverance from sin for thirty years at many a Hindoo shrine
and in many a Brahmanical scripture. One of the earliest tracts of
the Serampore press fell into his hands, and he at once walked forty
miles to seek fuller instruction from its author. His baptism gave
Carey just what the mission wanted, a good schoolmaster, and he soon
proved to be, even before Krishna in time, the first preacher to the
people. Of the same writer caste were Syam Dass, Petumber Mitter,
and his wife Draupadi, who was as brave as her young husband. The
despised soodras were represented by Syam's neighbour, Bharut, an
old man, who said he went to Christ because he was just falling into
hell and saw no other way of safety. The first Mohammedan convert
was Peroo, another neighbour of Syam Dass. From the spot on the
Soondarbans where Carey first began his life of missionary farmer,
there came to him at the close of 1802, in Calcutta, the first
Brahman who had bowed his neck to the Gospel in all India up to this
time, for we can hardly reckon Kiernander's case. Krishna Prosad,
then nineteen, "gave up his friends and his caste with much
fortitude, and is the first Brahman who has been baptised. The word
of Christ's death seems to have gone to his heart, and he continues
to receive the Word with meekness." The poita or sevenfold thread
which, as worn over the naked body, betokened his caste, he trampled
under foot, and another was given to him, that when preaching Christ
he might be a witness to the Brahmans at once that Christ is
irresistible and that an idol is nothing in the world. This he
voluntarily ceased to wear in a few years. Two more Brahmans were
brought in by Petumber Singhee in 1804, by the close of which year
the number of baptised converts was forty-eight, of whom forty were
native men and women. With the instinct of a true scholar and
Christian Carey kept to the apostolic practice, which has been too
often departed from--he consecrated the convert's name as well as
soul and body to Christ. Beside the "Hermes" of Rome to whom Paul
sent his salutation, he kept the "Krishna" of Serampore and
Calcutta.

The first act of the first convert, Krishna Pal, was of his own
accord to build a house for God immediately opposite his own, the
first native meeting-house in Bengal. Carey preached the first
sermon in it to twenty natives besides the family. On the side of
the high road, along which the car of Jagganath is dragged every
year, the missionaries purchased a site and built a preaching place,
a school, a house for Gokool, and a room for the old widow, at the
cost of Captain Wickes, who had rejoiced to witness their baptism.
The Brahman who owned the neighbouring land wished to sell it and
leave the place, "so much do these people abhor us." This little
purchase for £6 grew in time into the extensive settlement of
Jannagur, where about 1870 the last of Carey's converts passed away.
>From its native chapel, and in its village tank, many Hindoos have
since been led by their own ordained countrymen to put on Christ.
In time the church in the chapel on the Hoogli became chiefly
European and Eurasian, but on the first Sunday of the year, the
members of both churches meet together for solemn and joyful
communion, when the services are alternately in Bengali and English.

The longing for converts now gave place to anxiety that they might
continue to be Christians indeed. As in the early Corinthian
Church, all did not perceive at once the solemnities of the Lord's
Supper. Krishna Pal, for instance, jealous because the better
educated Petumber had been ordained to preach before him, made a
schism by administering it, and so filled the missionaries with
grief and fear; but he soon became penitent. Associated with men
who gave their all to Christ, the native members could not but learn
the lesson of self-support, so essential for a self-propagating
church, and so often neglected in the early history of missions, and
even still. On baptism Krishna received a new white dress with six
shillings; but such a gift, beautiful in itself, was soon
discontinued. A Mohammedan convert asked assistance to cultivate a
little ground and rear silkworms, but, writes Mr. Ward bowed down
with missionary cares, "We are desirous to avoid such a precedent."
Although these first converts were necessarily missionaries rather
than pastors for a time, each preacher received no more than six
rupees a month while in his own village, and double that when
itinerating. Carey and his colleagues were ever on the watch to
foster the spiritual life and growth of men and women born, and for
thirty or fifty years trained, in all the ideas and practices of a
system which is the very centre of opposition to teaching like
theirs. This record of an "experience meeting" of three men and
five women may be taken as a type of Bengali Christianity when it
was but two years old, and as a contrast to that which prevails a
century after:--

"Gokool. I have been the greatest of sinners, but I wish only to
think of the death of Christ. I rejoice that now people can no
longer despise the Gospel, and call us feringas; but they begin to
judge for themselves.

"Krishna Prosad. I have this week been thinking of the power of God,
that he can do all things; and of the necessity of minding all his
commands. I have thought also of my mother a great deal, who is now
become old, and who is constantly crying about me, thinking that I
have dishonoured the family and am lost. Oh that I could but once
go and tell her of the good news, as well as my brothers and
sisters, and open their eyes to the way of salvation!

"Ram Roteen. In my mind there is this: I see that all the debtahs
(idols) are nothing, and that Jesus Christ is the only Saviour. If
I can believe in him, and walk in his commandments, it may be well
with me.

"Rasoo. I am a great sinner; yet I wish continually to think of the
death of Christ. I had much comfort in the marriage of my daughter
(Onunda to Krishna Prosad). The neighbours talked much about it,
and seemed to think that it was much better that a man should choose
his own wife, than that people should be betrothed in their infancy
by their parents. People begin to be able to judge a little now
about the Christian ways.

"Jeymooni. In this country are many ways: the way of the debtahs;
the way of Jagganath, where all eat together; the way of Ghospara,
etc. Yet all these are vain. Yesoo Kreest's death, and Yesoo
Kreest's commands--this is the way of life! I long to see Kreest's
kingdom grow. This week I had much joy in talking to Gokool's
mother, whose heart is inclined to judge about the way of Kreest.
When I was called to go and talk with her, on the way I thought
within myself, but how can I explain the way of Kreest? I am but a
woman, and do not know much. Yet I recollected that the blessing
does not come from us: God can bless the weakest words. Many
Bengali women coming from the adjoining houses, sat down and heard
the word; and I was glad in hoping that the mercy of God might be
found by this old woman. [Gokool's mother.]

"Komal. I am a great sinner; yet I have been much rejoiced this week
in Gokool's mother coming to inquire about the Gospel. I had great
sorrow when Gokool was ill; and at one time I thought he would have
died; but God has graciously restored him. We have worldly sorrow,
but this lasts only for a time.

"Draupadi. This week I have had much sorrow on account of Petumber.
His mind is very bad: he sits in the house, and refuses to work;
and I know not what will become of him: yet Kreest's death is a true
word.

"Golook. I have had much joy in thinking of God's goodness to our
family. My sisters Onunda and Kesaree wish to be baptised, and to
come into the church. If I can believe in Kreest's death, and keep
his commands till death, then I shall be saved."

Carey was not only founding the Church of North India; he was
creating a new society, a community, which has its healthy roots in
the Christian family. Krishna Pal had come over with his household,
like the Philippian, and at once became his own and their gooroo or
priest. But the marriage difficulty was early forced on him and on
the missionaries. The first shape which persecution took was an
assault on his eldest daughter, Golook, who was carried off to the
house in Calcutta of the Hindoo to whom in infancy she had been
betrothed, or married according to Hindoo law enforced by the Danish
and British courts. As a Christian she loathed a connection which
was both idolatrous and polygamous. But she submitted for a time,
continuing, however, secretly to pray to Christ when beaten by her
husband for openly worshipping Him, and refusing to eat things
offered to the idol. At last it became intolerable. She fled to
her father, was baptised, and was after a time joined by her
penitent husband. The subject of what was to be done with converts
whose wives would not join them occupied the missionaries in
discussion every Sunday during 1803, and they at last referred it to
Andrew Fuller and the committee. Practically they anticipated the
Act in which Sir Henry Maine gave relief after the Scriptural mode.
They sent the husband to use every endeavour to induce his heathen
wife to join him; long delay or refusal they counted a sufficient
ground for divorce, and they allowed him to marry again. The other
case, which still troubles the native churches, of the duty of a
polygamous Christian, seems to have been solved according to Dr.
Doddridge's advice, by keeping such out of office in the church, and
pressing on the conscience of all the teaching of our Lord in
Matthew xix., and of Paul in 1st Corinthians vii.

In 1802 Carey drew up a form of agreement and of service for native
Christian marriages not unlike that of the Church of England. The
simple and pleasing ceremony in the case of Syam Dass presented a
contrast to the prolonged, expensive, and obscene rites of the
Hindoos, which attracted the people. When, the year after, a
Christian Brahman was united to a daughter of Krishna Pal, in the
presence of more than a hundred Hindoos, the unity of all in Christ
Jesus was still more marked:--

"Apr. 4, 1803.--This morning early we went to attend the wedding of
Krishna Prosad with Onunda, Krishna's second daughter. Krishna gave
him a piece of ground adjoining his dwelling, to build him a house,
and we lent Prosad fifty rupees for that purpose, which he is to
return monthly, out of his wages. We therefore had a meeting for
prayer in this new house, and many neighbours were present. Five
hymns were sung: brother Carey and Marshman prayed in Bengali.
After this we went under an open shed close to the house, where
chairs and mats were provided: here friends and neighbours sat all
around. Brother Carey sat at a table; and after a short
introduction, in which he explained the nature of marriage, and
noticed the impropriety of the Hindoo customs in this respect, he
read 2 Cor. vi. 14-18, and also the account of the marriage at Cana.
Then he read the printed marriage agreement, at the close of which
Krishna Prosad and Onunda, with joined hands, one after the other,
promised love, faithfulness, obedience, etc. They then signed the
agreement, and brethren Carey, Marshman, Ward, Chamberlain, Ram
Roteen, etc., signed as witnesses. The whole was closed with prayer
by brother Ward. Everything was conducted with the greatest decorum,
and it was almost impossible not to have been pleased. We returned
home to breakfast, and sent the new-married couple some sugar-candy,
plantains, and raisins; the first and last of these articles had
been made a present of to us, and the plantains were the produce of
the mission garden. In the evening we attended the monthly
prayer-meeting.

"Apr. 5.--This evening we all went to supper at Krishna's, and sat
under the shade where the marriage ceremony had been performed.
Tables, knives and forks, glasses, etc., having been taken from our
house, we had a number of Bengali plain dishes, consisting of curry,
fried fish, vegetables, etc., and I fancy most of us ate heartily.
This is the first instance of our eating at the house of our native
brethren. At this table we all sat with the greatest cheerfulness,
and some of the neighbours looked on with a kind of amazement. It
was a new and very singular sight in this land where clean and
unclean is so much regarded. We should have gone in the daytime,
but were prevented by the heat and want of leisure. We began this
wedding supper with singing, and concluded with prayer: between ten
and eleven we returned home with joy. This was a glorious triumph
over the caste! A Brahman married to a soodra, in the Christian
way: Englishmen eating with the married couple and their friends, at
the same table, and at a native house. Allowing the Hindoo
chronology to be true, there has not been such a sight in Bengal
these millions of years!"

In the same year the approaching death of Gokool led the
missionaries to purchase the acre of ground, near the present
railway station, in which lies the dust of themselves and their
converts, and of a child of the Judsons, till the Resurrection.
Often did Carey officiate at the burial of Europeans in the Danish
cemetery. Previous to his time the only service there consisted in
the Government secretary dropping a handful of earth on the coffin.
In the native God's-acre, as in the Communion of the Lord's Table,
and in the simple rites which accompanied the burial of the dead in
Christ, the heathen saw the one lofty platform of loving
self-sacrifice to which the Cross raises all its children:--

"Oct. 7.--Our dear friend Gokool is gone: he departed at two this
morning. At twelve he called the brethren around him to sing and
pray; was perfectly sensible, resigned, and tranquil. Some of the
neighbours had been persuading him the day before to employ a native
doctor; he however refused, saying he would have no physician but
Jesus Christ. On their saying, How is it that you who have turned
to Christ should be thus afflicted? He replied, My affliction is on
account of my sins; my Lord does all things well! Observing Komal
weep (who had been a most affectionate wife), he said, Why do you
weep for me? Only pray, etc. From the beginning of his illness he
had little hope of recovery; yet he never murmured, nor appeared at
all anxious for medicine. His answer constantly was, "I am in my
Lord's hands, I want no other physician!' His patience throughout
was astonishing: I never heard him say once that his pain was great.
His tranquil and happy end has made a deep impression on our
friends: they say one to another, 'May my mind be as Gokool's was!'
When we consider, too, that this very man grew shy of us three
years ago, because we opposed his notion that believers would never
die, the grace now bestowed upon him appears the more remarkable.
Knowing the horror the Hindoos have for a dead body, and how
unwilling they are to contribute any way to its interment, I had the
coffin made at our house the preceding day, by carpenters whom we
employ. They would not, however, carry it to the house. The
difficulty now was, to carry him to the grave. The usual mode of
Europeans is to hire a set of men (Portuguese), who live by it. But
besides that our friends could never constantly sustain that
expense, I wished exceedingly to convince them of the propriety of
doing that last kind office for a brother themselves. But as
Krishna had been ill again the night before, and two of our brethren
were absent with brother Ward, we could only muster three persons.
I evidently saw the only way to supply the deficiency; and brother
Carey being from home, I sounded Felix and William, and we
determined to make the trial; and at five in the afternoon repaired
to the house. Thither were assembled all our Hindoo brethren and
sisters, with a crowd of natives that filled the yard, and lined the
street. We brought the remains of our dear brother out, whose
coffin Krishna had covered within and without with white muslin at
his own expense; then, in the midst of the silent and astonished
multitude, we improved the solemn moment by singing a hymn of
Krishna's, the chorus of which is 'Salvation by the death of
Christ.' Bhairub the brahmàn, Peroo the mussulman, Felix and I took
up the coffin; and, with the assistance of Krishna and William,
conveyed it to its long home: depositing it in the grave, we sung
two appropriate hymns. After this, as the crowd was accumulating, I
endeavoured to show the grounds of our joyful hope even in death,
referring to the deceased for a proof of its efficacy: told them
that indeed he had been a great sinner, as they all knew, and for
that reason could find no way of salvation among them; but when he
heard of Jesus Christ, he received him as a suitable and
all-sufficient Saviour, put his trust in him, and died full of
tranquil hope. After begging them to consider their own state, we
prayed, sung Moorad's hymn, and distributed papers. The concourse
of people was great, perhaps 500: they seemed much struck with the
novelty of the scene, and with the love and regard Christians
manifest to each other, even in death; so different from their
throwing their friends, half dead and half living, into the river;
or burning their body, with perhaps a solitary attendant."

Preaching, teaching, and Bible translating were from the first
Carey's three missionary methods, and in all he led the missionaries
who have till the present followed him with a success which he never
hesitated to expect, as one of the "great things" from God. His work
for the education of the people of India, especially in their own
vernacular and classical languages, was second only to that which
gave them a literature sacred and pure. Up to 1794, when at
Mudnabati he opened the first primary school worthy of the name in
all India at his own cost, and daily superintended it, there had
been only one attempt to improve upon the indigenous schools, which
taught the children of the trading castes only to keep rude
accounts, or upon the tols in which the Brahmans instructed their
disciples for one-half the year, while for the other half they lived
by begging. That attempt was made by Schwartz at Combaconum, the
priestly Oxford of South India, where the wars with Tipoo soon put
an end to a scheme supported by both the Raja of Tanjore and the
British Government. When Carey moved to Serampore and found
associated with him teachers so accomplished and enthusiastic as
Marshman and his wife, education was not long in taking its place in
the crusade which was then fully organised for the conversion of
Southern and Eastern Asia. At Madras, too, Bell had stumbled upon
the system of "mutual instruction" which he had learned from the
easy methods of the indigenous schoolmaster, and which he and
Lancaster taught England to apply to the clamant wants of the
country, and to improve into the monitorial, pupil-teacher and
grant-in-aid systems. Carey had all the native schools of the
mission "conducted upon Lancaster's plan."

In Serampore, and in every new station as it was formed, a free
school was opened. We have seen how the first educated convert,
Petumber, was made schoolmaster. So early as October 1800 we find
Carey writing home:--"The children in our Bengali free school, about
fifty, are mostly very young. Yet we are endeavouring to instil
into their minds Divine truth, as fast as their understandings
ripen. Some natives have complained that we are poisoning the minds
even of their very children." The first attempt to induce the boys
to write out the catechism in Bengali resulted, as did Duff's to get
them to read aloud the Sermon on the Mount thirty years after, in a
protest that their caste was in danger. But the true principles of
toleration and discipline were at once explained--"that the children
will never be compelled to do anything that will make them lose
caste; that though we abhor the caste we do not wish any to lose it
but by their own choice. After this we shall insist on the children
doing what they have been ordered." A few of the oldest boys
withdrew for a time, declaring that they feared they would be sent
on board ship to England, and the baptism of each of the earlier
converts caused a panic. But instruction on honest methods soon
worked out the true remedy. Two years after we find this
report:--"The first class, consisting of catechumens, are now
learning in Bengali the first principles of Christianity; and will
hereafter be instructed in the rudiments of history, geography,
astronomy, etc. The second class, under two other masters, learn to
read and write Bengali and English. The third class, consisting of
the children of natives who have not lost caste, learn only Bengali.
This school is in a promising state, and is liberally supported by
the subscriptions of Europeans in this country."

Carey's early success led Mr. Creighton of Malda to open at Goamalty
several Bengali free schools, and to draw up a scheme for extending
such Christian nurseries all over the country at a cost of £10 for
the education of fifty children. Only by the year 1806 was such a
scheme practicable, because Carey had translated the Scriptures,
and, as Creighton noted, "a variety of introductory and explanatory
tracts and catechisms in the Bengali and Hindostani tongues have
already been circulated in some parts of the country, and any number
may be had gratis from the Mission House, Serampore." As only a few
of the Brahman and writer castes could read, and not one woman, "a
general perusal of the Scriptures amongst natives will be
impracticable till they are taught to read." But nothing was done,
save by the missionaries, till 1835, when Lord William Bentinck
received Adam's report on the educational destitution of Bengal.

Referring to Creighton's scheme, Mr. Ward's journal thus chronicles
the opening of the first Sunday school in India in July 1803 by
Carey's sons:--

"Last Lord's day a kind of Sunday school was opened, which will be
superintended principally by our young friends Felix and William
Carey, and John Fernandez. It will chiefly be confined to teaching
catechisms in Bengali and English, as the children learn to read and
write every day. I have received a letter from a gentleman up the
country, who writes very warmly respecting the general establishment
of Christian schools all over Bengal."

Not many years had passed since Raikes had begun Sunday schools in
England. Their use seems to have passed away with the three
Serampore missionaries for a time, and to have been again extended
by the American missionaries about 1870. There are now above
200,000 boys and girls at such schools in India, and three-fourths
of these are non-Christians.

As from the first Carey drew converts from all classes, the
Armenians, the Portuguese, and the Eurasians, as well as the natives
of India, he and Mr. and Mrs. Marshman especially took care to
provide schools for their children. The necessity, indeed, of this
was forced upon them by the facts that the brotherhood began with
nine children, and that boarding-schools for these classes would
form an honourable source of revenue to the mission. Hence this
advertisement, which appeared in March 1800:--"Mission, House,
Serampore.--On Thursday, the 1st of May 1800, a school will be
opened at this house, which stands in a very healthy and pleasant
situation by the side of the river. Letters add to Mr. Carey will
be immediately attended to." The cost of boarding and fees varied
from £45 to £50 a year, according as "Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Persian,
or Sanskrit" lessons were included. "Particular attention will be
paid to the correct pronunciation of the English language" was added
for reasons which the mixed parentage of the pupils explains. Such
was the first sign of a care for the Eurasians not connected with
the army, which, as developed by Marshman and Mack, began in 1823 to
take the form of the Doveton College. The boys' school was soon
followed by a girls' school, through which a stream of Christian
light radiated forth over resident Christian society, and from which
many a missionary came.

Carey's description of the mixed community is the best we have of
its origin as well as of the state of European society in India,
alike when the Portuguese were dominant, and at the beginning of the
nineteenth century when the East India Company were most afraid of
Christianity:--"The Portuguese are a people who, in the estimation
of both Europeans and natives, are sunk below the Hindoos or
Mussulmans. However, I am of opinion that they are rated much too
low. They are chiefly descendants of the slaves of the Portuguese
who first landed here, or of the children of those Portuguese by
their female slaves; and being born in their house, were made
Christians in their infancy by what is called baptism, and had
Portuguese names given them. It is no wonder that these people,
despised as they are by Europeans, and being consigned to the
teachings of very ignorant Popish priests, should be sunk into such
a state of degradation. So gross, indeed, are their superstitions,
that I have seen a Hindoo image-maker carrying home an image of
Christ on the cross between two thieves, to the house of a
Portuguese. Many of them, however, can read and write English well
and understand Portuguese...

"Besides these, there are many who are the children of Europeans by
native women, several of whom are well educated, and nearly all of
them Protestants by profession. These, whether children of English,
French, Dutch, or Danes, by native women, are called Portuguese.
Concubinage here is so common, that few unmarried Europeans are
without a native woman, with whom they live as if married; and I
believe there are but few instances of separation, except in case of
marriage with European women, in which case the native woman is
dismissed with an allowance: but the children of these marriages are
never admitted to table with company, and are universally treated by
the English as an inferior species of beings. Hence they are often
shame-faced yet proud and conceited, and endeavour to assume that
honour to themselves which is denied them by others. This class may
be regarded as forming a connecting link between Europeans and
natives. The Armenians are few in number, but chiefly rich. I have
several times conversed with them about religion: they hear with
patience, and wonder that any Englishman should make that a subject
of conversation."

While the Marshmans gave their time from seven in the morning till
three in the afternoon to these boarding-schools started by Carey in
1800 for the higher education of the Eurasians, Carey himself, in
Calcutta, early began to care for the destitute. His efforts
resulted in the establishment of the "Benevolent Institution for the
Instruction of Indigent Children," which the contemporary Bengal
civilian, Charles Lushington, in his History extols as one of the
monuments of active and indefatigable benevolence due to Serampore.
Here, on the Lancaster system, and superintended by Carey, Mr. and
Mrs. Penney had as many as 300 boys and 100 girls under Christian
instruction of all ages up to twenty-four, and of every
race:--"Europeans, native Portuguese, Armenians, Mugs, Chinese,
Hindoos, Mussulmans, natives of Sumatra, Mozambik, and Abyssinia."
This official reporter states that thus more than a thousand youths
had been rescued from vice and ignorance and advanced in usefulness
to society, in a degree of opulence and respectability. The origin
of this noble charity is thus told to Dr. Ryland by Carey himself in
a letter which unconsciously reveals his own busy life, records the
missionary influence of the higher schools, and reports the
existence of the mission over a wide area. He writes from Calcutta
on 24th May 1811:--

"A year ago we opened a free school in Calcutta. This year we added
to it a school for girls. There are now in it about 140 boys and
near 40 girls. One of our deacons, Mr. Leonard, a most valuable and
active man, superintends the boys, and a very pious woman, a member
of the church, is over the girls. The Institution meets with
considerable encouragement, and is conducted upon Lancaster's plan.
We meditate another for instruction of Hindoo youths in the
Sanskrit language, designing, however, to introduce the study of the
Sanskrit Bible into it; indeed it is as good as begun; it will be in
Calcutta. By brother and sister Marshman's encouragement there are
two schools in our own premises at Serampore for the gratuitous
instruction of youth of both sexes, supported and managed wholly by
the male and female scholars in our own school. These young persons
appear to enter with pleasure into the plan, contribute their money
to its support, and give instruction in turns to the children of
these free schools. I trust we shall be able to enlarge this plan,
and to spread its influence far about the country. Our brethren in
the Isles of France and Bourbon seem to be doing good; some of them
are gone to Madagascar, and, as if to show that Divine Providence
watches over them, the ship on which they went was wrecked soon
after they had landed from it. A number of our members are now gone
to Java; I trust their going thither will not be in vain. Brother
Chamberlain is, ere this, arrived at Agra...We preach every week in
the Fort and in the public prison, both in English and Bengali."

Carey had not been six months at Serampore when he saw the
importance of using the English language as a missionary weapon, and
he proposed this to Andrew Fuller. The other pressing duties of a
pioneer mission to the people of Bengal led him to postpone
immediate action in this direction; we shall have occasion to trace
the English influence of the press and the college hereafter. But
meanwhile the vernacular schools, which soon numbered a hundred
altogether, were most popular, and then as now proved most valuable
feeders of the infant Church. Without them, wrote the three
missionaries to the Society, "the whole plan must have been nipped
in the bud, since, if the natives had not cheerfully sent their
children, everything else would have been useless. But the
earnestness with which they have sought these schools exceeds
everything we had previously expected. We are still constantly
importuned for more schools, although we have long gone beyond the
extent of our funds." It was well that thus early, in schools, in
books and tracts, and in providing the literary form and apparatus
of the vernacular languages, Carey laid the foundation of the new
national or imperial civilisation. When the time for English came,
the foundations were at least above the ground. Laid deep and
strong in the very nature of the people, the structure has thus far
promised to be national rather than foreign, though raised by
foreign hands, while marked by the truth and the purity of its
Western architects.

The manifestation of Christ to the Bengalees could not be made
without rousing the hate and the opposition of the vested interests
of Brahmanism. So long as Carey was an indigo planter as well as a
proselytiser in Dinapoor and Malda he met with no opposition, for he
had no direct success. But when, from Serampore, he and the others,
by voice, by press, by school, by healing the sick and visiting the
poor, carried on the crusade day by day with the gentle persistency
of a law of nature, the cry began. And when, by the breaking of
caste and the denial of Krishna's Christian daughter Golook to the
Hindoo to whom she had been betrothed from infancy, the Brahmans
began dimly to apprehend that not only their craft but the whole
structure of society was menaced, the cry became louder, and, as in
Ephesus of old, an appeal was made to the magistrates against the
men who were turning the world upside down. At first the very boys
taunted the missionaries in the streets with the name of Jesus
Christ. Then, after Krishna and his family had broken caste, they
were seized by a mob and hurried before the Danish magistrate, who
at first refused to hand over a Christian girl to a heathen, and
gave her father a guard to prevent her from being murdered, until
the Calcutta magistrate decided that she must join her husband but
would be protected in the exercise of her new faith. The commotion
spread over the whole densely-peopled district. But the people were
not with the Brahmans, and the excitement sent many a sin-laden
inquirer to Serampore from a great distance. "The fire is now
already kindled for which our Redeemer expressed his strong desire,"
wrote Carey to Ryland in March 1801. A year later he used this
language to his old friend Morris at Clipstone village:--"I think
there is such a fermentation raised in Bengal by the little leaven,
that there is a hope of the whole lump by degrees being leavened.
God is carrying on his work; and though it goes forward, yet no one
can say who is the instrument. Doubtless, various means contribute
towards it; but of late the printing and dispersing of New
Testaments and small tracts seem to have the greatest effect."

In a spirit the opposite of Jonah's the whole brotherhood, then
consisting of the three, of Carey's son Felix, and of a new
missionary, Chamberlain, sent home this review of their position at
the close of 1804:--

"We are still a happy, healthful, and highly favoured family. But
though we would feel incessant gratitude for these gourds, yet we
would not feel content unless Nineveh be brought to repentance. We
did not come into this country to be placed in what are called easy
circumstances respecting this world; and we trust that nothing but
the salvation of souls will satisfy us. True, before we set off, we
thought we could die content if we should be permitted to see the
half of what we have already seen; yet now we seem almost as far
from the mark of our missionary high calling as ever. If three
millions of men were drowning, he must be a monster who should be
content with saving one individual only; though for the deliverance
of that one he would find cause for perpetual gratitude."

In 1810 the parent mission at Serampore had so spread into numerous
stations and districts that a new organisation became necessary.
There were 300 converts, of whom 105 had been added in that year.
"Did you expect to see this eighteen years ago?" wrote Marshman to
the Society. "But what may we not expect if God continues to bless
us in years to come?" Marshman forgot how Carey had, in 1792, told
them on the inspired evangelical prophet's authority to "expect
great things from God." Henceforth the one mission became fivefold
for a time.





CHAPTER VII

CALCUTTA AND THE MISSION CENTRES FROM DELHI TO AMBOYNA

1802-1817

The East India Company an unwilling partner of Carey--Calcutta
opened to the Mission by his appointment as Government teacher of
Bengali--Meeting of 1802 grows into the Lall Bazaar
mission--Christ-like work among the poor, the sick, the prisoners,
the soldiers and sailors and the natives--Krishna Pal first native
missionary in Calcutta--Organisation of subordinate
stations--Carey's "United Missions in India"--The missionary staff
thirty strong--The native missionaries--The Bengali church
self-propagating--Carey the pioneer of other
missionaries--Benares--Burma and Indo-China--Felix
Carey--Instructions to missionaries--The missionary shrivelled into
an ambassador--Adoniram and Ann Judson--Jabez Carey--Mission to
Amboyna--Remarkable letter from Carey to his third son.

The short-sighted regulation of the East India Company, which
dreamed that it could keep Christianity out of Bengal by shutting up
the missionaries within the little territory of Danish Serampore,
could not be enforced with the same ease as the order of a jailer.
Under Danish passports, and often without them, missionary tours
were made over Central Bengal, aided by its network of rivers.
Every printed Bengali leaf of Scripture or pure literature was a
missionary. Every new convert, even the women, became an apostle to
their people, and such could not be stopped. Gradually, as not only
the innocency but the positive political usefulness of the
missionaries' character and work came to be recognised by the local
authorities, they were let alone for a time. And soon, by the same
historic irony which has marked so many of the greatest reforms--"He
that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh"--the Government of India
became, though unwittingly, more of a missionary agency than the
Baptist Society itself. The only teacher of Bengal who could be
found for Lord Wellesley's new College of Fort William was William
Carey. The appointment, made and accepted without the slightest
prejudice to his aggressive spiritual designs and work, at once
opened Calcutta itself for the first time to the English
proselytising of natives, and supplied Carey with the only means yet
lacking for the translation of the Scriptures into all the languages
of the farther East. In spite of its own selfish fears the Company
became a principal partner in the Christianisation of India and
China.

>From the middle of the year 1801 and for the next thirty years Carey
spent as much of his time in the metropolis as in Serampore. He was
generally rowed down the eighteen miles of the winding river to
Calcutta at sunset on Monday evening and returned on Friday night
every week, working always by the way. At first he personally
influenced the Bengali traders and youths who knew English, and he
read with many such the English Bible. His chaplain friends, Brown
and Buchanan, with the catholicity born of their presbyterian and
evangelical training, shared his sympathy with the hundreds of poor
mixed Christians for whom St. John's and even the Mission Church
made no provision, and encouraged him to care for them. In 1802 he
began a weekly meeting for prayer and conversation in the house of
Mr. Rolt, and another for a more ignorant class in the house of a
Portuguese Christian. By 1803 he was able to write to Fuller: "We
have opened a place of worship in Calcutta, where we have preaching
twice on Lord's day in English, on Wednesday evening in Bengali, and
on Thursday evening in English." He took all the work during the
week and the Sunday service in rotation with his brethren. The
first church was the hall of a well-known undertaker, approached
through lines of coffins and the trappings of woe. In time most of
the evangelical Christians in the city promised to relieve the
missionaries of the expense if they would build an unsectarian
chapel more worthy of the object. This was done in Lall Bazaar, a
little withdrawn from that thoroughfare to this day of the poor and
abandoned Christians, of the sailors and soldiers on leave, of the
liquor-shops and the stews. There, as in Serampore, at a time when
the noble hospitals of Calcutta were not, and the children of only
the "services" were cared for, "Brother Carey gave them medicine for
their bodies and the best medicine for their poor souls," as a
contemporary widow describes it. The site alone cost so much--a
thousand pounds--that only a mat chapel could be built. Marshman
raised another £1100 in ten days, and after delays caused by the
police Government sanctioned the building which Carey opened on
Sunday, 1st January 1809. But he and his colleagues "not
episcopally ordained" were forbidden to preach to British soldiers
and to the Armenians and Portuguese. "Carey's Baptist Chapel" is now
its name. Here was for nearly a whole generation a sublime
spectacle--the Northamptonshire shoemaker training the governing
class of India in Sanskrit, Bengali, and Marathi all day, and
translating the Ramayana and the Veda, and then, when the sun went
down, returning to the society of "the maimed, the halt, and the
blind, and many with the leprosy," to preach in several tongues the
glad tidings of the Kingdom to the heathen of England as well as of
India, and all with a loving tenderness and patient humility learned
in the childlike school of Him who said, "Wist ye not that I must be
about my Father's business?"

Street preaching was added to the apostolic agencies, and for this
prudence dictated recourse to the Asiatic and Eurasian converts. We
find the missionaries writing to the Society at the beginning of
1807, after the mutiny at Vellore, occasioned as certainly by the
hatlike turban then ordered, as the mutiny of Bengal half a century
after was by the greased cartridges:--

"We now return to Calcutta; not, however, without a sigh. How can
we avoid sighing when we think of the number of perishing souls
which this city contains, and recollect the multitudes who used of
late to hang upon our lips; standing in the thick-wedged crowd for
hours together, in the heat of a Bengal summer, listening to the
word of life! We feel thankful, however, that nothing has been
found against us, except in the matters of our God. Conscious of the
most cordial attachment to the British Government, and of the
liveliest interest in its welfare, we might well endure reproach
were it cast upon us; but the tongue of calumny itself has not to
our knowledge been suffered to bring the slightest accusation
against us. We still worship at Calcutta in a private house, and
our congregation rather increases. We are going on with the chapel.
A family of Armenians also, who found it pleasant to attend divine
worship in the Bengali language, have erected a small place on their
premises for the sake of the natives."

Krishna Pal became the first native missionary to Calcutta, where he
in 1810 had preached at fourteen different places every week, and
visited forty-one families, to evangelise the servants of the richer
and bring in the members of the poorer. Sebuk Ram was added to the
staff. Carey himself thus sums up the labours of the year 1811,
when he was still the only pastor of the Christian poor, and the
only resident missionary to half a million of natives:--

"Calcutta is three miles long and one broad, very populous; the
environs are crowded with people settled in large villages,
resembling (for population, not elegance) the environs of
Birmingham. The first is about a mile south of the city; at nearly
the same distance are the public jail and the general hospital.
Brother Gordon, one of our deacons, being the jailer we preach
there in English every Lord's day. We did preach in the Fort; but
of late a military order has stopped us. Krishna and Sebuk Ram,
however, preach once or twice a week in the Fort notwithstanding;
also at the jail; in the house of correction; at the village of
Alipore, south of the jail; at a large factory north of the city,
where several hundreds are employed; and at ten or twelve houses in
different parts of the city itself. In several instances Roman
Catholics, having heard the word, have invited them to their houses,
and having collected their neighbours, the one or the other have
received the word with gladness.

"The number of inquirers constantly coming forward, awakened by the
instrumentality of these brethren, fills me with joy. I do not know
that I am of much use myself, but I see a work which fills my soul
with thankfulness. Not having time to visit the people, I
appropriate every Thursday evening to receiving the visits of
inquirers. Seldom fewer than twenty come; and the simple
confessions of their sinful state, the unvarnished declaration of
their former ignorance, the expressions of trust in Christ and
gratitude to him, with the accounts of their spiritual conflicts
often attended with tears which almost choke their utterance,
presents a scene of which you can scarcely entertain an adequate
idea. At the same time, meetings for prayer and mutual edification
are held every night in the week; and some nights, for convenience,
at several places at the same time: so that the sacred leaven
spreads its influence through the mass."

On his voyage to India Carey had deliberately contemplated the time
when the Society he had founded would influence not only Asia, but
Africa, and he would supply the peoples of Asia with the Scriptures
in their own tongues. The time had come by 1804 for organising the
onward movement, and he thus describes it to Ryland:--

"14th December 1803.--Another plan has lately occupied our
attention. It appears that our business is to provide materials for
spreading the Gospel, and to apply those materials. Translations,
pamphlets, etc., are the materials. To apply them we have thought
of setting up a number of subordinate stations, in each of which a
brother shall be fixed. It will be necessary and useful to carry on
some worldly business. Let him be furnished from us with a sum of
money to begin and purchase cloth or whatever other article the part
produces in greatest perfection: the whole to belong to the mission,
and no part even to be private trade or private property. The gains
may probably support the station. Every brother in such a station
to have one or two native brethren with him, and to do all he can to
preach, and spread Bibles, pamphlets, etc., and to set up and
encourage schools where the reading of the Scriptures shall be
introduced. At least four brethren shall always reside at
Serampore, which must be like the heart while the other stations are
the members. Each one must constantly send a monthly account of
both spirituals and temporals to Serampore, and the brethren at
Serampore (who must have a power of control over the stations) must
send a monthly account likewise to each station, with advice, etc.,
as shall be necessary. A plan of this sort appears to be more
formidable than it is in reality. To find proper persons will be
the greatest difficulty; but as it will prevent much of that
abrasion which may arise from a great number of persons living in
one house, so it will give several brethren an opportunity of being
useful, whose temper may not be formed to live in a common family,
and at the same time connect them as much to the body as if they all
lived together. We have judged that about 2000 rupees will do to
begin at each place, and it is probable that God will enable us to
find money (especially if assisted in the translations and printing
by our brethren in England) as fast as you will be able to find men.

"This plan may be extended through a circular surface of a thousand
miles' radius, and a constant communication kept up between the
whole, and in some particular cases it may extend ever farther. We
are also to hope that God may raise up some missionaries in this
country who may be more fitted for the work than any from England
can be. At present we have not concluded on anything, but when
Brother Ward comes down we hope to do so, and I think one station
may be fixed on immediately which Brother Chamberlain may occupy. A
late favourable providence will, I hope, enable us to begin, viz.,
the College have subscribed for 100 copies of my Sanskrit Grammar,
which will be 6400 rupees or 800 pounds sterling. The motion was
very generously made by H. Colebrooke, Esq., who is engaged in a
similar work, and seconded by Messrs. Brown and Buchanan; indeed it
met with no opposition. It will scarcely be printed off under
twelve months more, but it is probable that the greatest part of the
money will he advanced. The Maratha war and the subjugation of the
country of Cuttak to the English may be esteemed a favourable event
for the spreading of the Gospel, and will certainly contribute much
to the comfort of the inhabitants."

Two years later he thus anticipates the consent of the local
Government, in spite of the Company's determined hostility in
England, but the Vellore mutiny panic led to further delay:--

"25th December 1805.--It has long been a favourite object with me to
fix European brethren in different parts of the country at about two
hundred miles apart, so that each shall be able to visit a circle of
a hundred miles' radius, and within each of the circuits to place
native brethren at proper distances, who will, till they are more
established, be under the superintendence of the European brethren
situated in the centre. Our brethren concur with me in this plan.
In consequence of this, I thought it would be desirable to have
leave of Government for them to settle, and preach, without control,
in any part of the country. The Government look on us with a
favourable eye; and owing to Sir G. Barlow, the Governor-General,
being up the country, Mr. Udny is Vice-President and
Deputy-Governor. I therefore went one morning, took a breakfast
with him, and told him what we were doing and what we wished to do.
He, in a very friendly manner, desired me to state to him in a
private letter all that we wished, and offered to communicate
privately with Sir G. Barlow upon the subject, and inform me of the
result. I called on him again last week, when he informed me that
he had written upon the subject and was promised a speedy reply.
God grant that it may be favourable. I know that Government will
allow it if their powers are large enough."

Not till 1810 could Carey report that "permission was obtained of
Government for the forming of a new station at Agra, a large city in
upper Hindostan, not far from Delhi and the country of the Sikhs,"
to which Chamberlain and an assistant were sent. From that year the
Bengal became only the first of "The United Missions in India."
These were five in number, each under its own separate brotherhood,
on the same principles of self-denial as the original, each a
Lindisfarne sprung from the parent Iona. These five were the Bengal,
the Burman, the Orissa, the Bhootan, and the Hindostan Missions.
The Bengal mission was fourfold--Serampore and Calcutta reckoned as
one station; the old Dinapoor and Sadamahal which had taken the
place of Mudnabati; Goamalty, near Malda; Cutwa, an old town on the
upper waters of the Hoogli; Jessor, the agricultural capital of its
lower delta; and afterwards Monghyr, Berhampore, Moorshedabad,
Dacca, Chittagong, and Assam. The Bhootan missionaries were
plundered and driven out. The Hindostan mission soon included Gaya,
Patna, Deegah, Ghazeepore, Benares, Allahabad, Cawnpore, Ajmer, and
Delhi itself. From Nagpoor, in the very centre of India, and Surat
to the north of Bombay, Carey sought to bring Marathas and
Goojaratees under the yoke of Christ. China, where the East India
Company was still master, was cared for by the press, as we shall
see. Not content with the continent of Asia, Carey's mission, at
once forced by the intolerance which refused to allow new
missionaries to land in India proper, and led by the invitations of
Sir Stamford Raffles, extended to Java and Amboyna, Penang, Ceylon,
and even Mauritius. The elaborate review of their position, signed
by the three faithful men of Serampore, at the close of 1817, amazes
the reader at once by the magnitude and variety of the operations,
the childlike modesty of the record, and the heroism of the toil
which supplied the means.

At the time of the organisation into the Five United Missions the
staff of workers had grown to be thirty strong. From England there
were nine surviving:--Carey, Marshman, Ward, Chamberlain, Mardon,
Moore, Chater, Rowe, and Robinson. Raised up in India itself there
were seven--the two sons of Carey, Felix and William; Fernandez, his
first convert at Dinapoor; Peacock and Cornish, and two Armenians,
Aratoon and Peters; two were on probation for the ministry, Leonard
and Forder. Besides seven Hindoo evangelists also on probation,
there were five survivors of the band of converts called from time
to time to the ministry--Krishna Pal, the first, who is entered on
the list as "the beloved"; Krishna Dass, Ram Mohun, Seeta Ram, and
Seeta Dass. Carey's third son Jabez was soon to become the most
advanced of the three brothers away in far Amboyna. His father had
long prayed, and besought others to pray, that he too might be a
missionary. For the last fifteen years of his life Jabez was his
closest and most valued correspondent.

But only less dear than his own sons to the heart of the father,
already in 1817 described in an official letter as "our aged brother
Carey," were the native missionaries and pastors, his sons in the
faith. He sent forth the educated Petumber Singh, first in November
1802, to his countrymen at Sooksagar, and "gave him a suitable and
solemn charge: the opportunity was very pleasant." In May 1803
Krishna Pal was similarly set apart. At the same time the young
Brahman, Krishna Prosad, "delivered his first sermon in Bengali,
much to the satisfaction of our brethren." Six months after, Ward
reports of him in Dinapoor:--"The eyes of the people were fixed
listening to Prosad; he is becoming eloquent." In 1804 their
successful probation resulted in their formal ordination by prayer
and the laying on of the hands of the brethren, when Carey addressed
them from the divine words, "As my Father hath sent me so send I
you," and all commemorated the Lord's death till He come. Krishna
Dass was imprisoned unjustly, for a debt which he had paid, but "he
did not cease to declare to the native men in power that he was a
Christian, when they gnashed upon him with their teeth. He preached
almost all night to the prisoners, who heard the word with
eagerness." Two years after he was ordained, Carey charged him as
Paul had written to Timothy, "in the sight of God and of Christ
Jesus, who shall judge the quick and the dead," to be instant in
season and out of season, to reprove, rebuke, exhort with all
long-suffering and teaching. Ram Mohun was a Brahman, the fruit of
old Petumber's ministry, and had his ability as a student and
preacher of the Scriptures consecrated to Christ on the death of
Krishna Prosad, while the missionaries thus saw again answered the
invocation they had sung, in rude strains, in the ship which brought
them to India:--

"Bid Brahmans preach the heavenly word
Beneath the banian's shade;
Oh let the Hindoo feel its power
And grace his soul pervade."

So early as 1806 the missionaries thus acknowledged the value of the
work of their native brethren, and made of all the native converts a
Missionary Church. In the delay and even failure to do this of
their successors of all Churches we see the one radical point in
which the Church in India has as yet come short of its duty and its
privilege:--

"We have availed ourselves of the help of native brethren ever since
we had one who dared to speak in the name of Christ, and their
exertions have chiefly been the immediate means by which our church
has been increased. But we have lately been revolving a plan for
rendering their labours more extensively useful; namely, that of
sending them out, two and two, without any European brother. It
appeared also a most desirable object to interest in this work, as
much as possible, the whole of the native church among us: indeed,
we have had much in them of this nature to commend. In order, then,
more effectually to answer this purpose, we called an extraordinary
meeting of all the brethren on Friday evening, Aug. 8, 1806, and
laid before them the following ideas:--

"1. That the intention of the Saviour, in calling them out of
darkness into marvellous light, was that they should labour to the
uttermost in advancing his cause among their countrymen.

"2. That it was therefore their indispensable duty, both
collectively and individually, to strive by every means to bring
their countrymen to the knowledge of the Saviour; that if we, who
were strangers, thought it our duty to come from a country so
distant, for this purpose, much more was it incumbent on them to
labour for the same end. This was therefore the grand business of
our lives.

"3. That if a brother in discharge of this duty went out forty or
fifty miles, he could not labour for his family; it therefore became
the church to support such, seeing they were hindered from
supporting themselves, by giving themselves wholly to that work in
which it was equally the duty of all to take a share.

"4. We therefore proposed to unite the support of itinerant brethren
with the care of the poor, and to throw them both upon the church
fund, as being both, at least in a heathen land, equally the duty of
a church.

"Every one of these ideas our native brethren entered into with the
greatest readiness and the most cordial approbation."

Carey's scheme so early as 1810 included not only the capital of the
Great Mogul, Surat far to the west, and Maratha Nagpoor to the
south, but Lahore, where Ranjeet Singh had consolidated the Sikh
power, Kashmeer, and even Afghanistan to which he had sent the
Pushtoo Bible. To set Chamberlain free for this enterprise he sent
his second son William to relieve him as missionary in charge of
Cutwa. "This would secure the gradual perfection of the version of
the Scriptures in the Sikh language, would introduce the Gospel
among the people, and would open a way for introducing it into
Kashmeer, and eventually to the Afghans under whose dominion
Kashmeer at present is." Carey and his two colleagues took
possession for Christ of the principal centres of Hindoo and
Mohammedan influence in India only because they were unoccupied, and
provided translations of the Bible into the principal tongues,
avowedly as a preparation for other missionary agencies. All over
India and the far East he thus pioneered the way of the Lord, as he
had written to Ryland when first he settled in Serampore:--"It is
very probable we may be only as pioneers to prepare the way for most
successful missionaries, who perhaps may not be at liberty to attend
to those preparatory labours in which we have been occupied--the
translation and printing of the Scriptures," etc. His heart was
enlarged like his Master's on earth, and hence his humbleness of
mind. When the Church Missionary Society, for instance, occupied
Agra as their first station in India, he sent the Baptist missionary
thence to Allahabad. To Benares "Brother William Smith, called in
Orissa under Brother John Peters," the Armenian, was sent owing to
his acquaintance with the Hindi language; he was the means of
bringing to the door of the Kingdom that rich Brahman Raja Jay
Narain Ghosal, whom he encouraged to found in 1817 the Church
Mission College there which bears the name of this "almost
Christian" Hindoo, who was "exceedingly desirous of diffusing light
among his own countrymen."

The most striking illustrations of this form of Carey's
self-sacrifice are, however, to be found outside of India as it then
was, in the career of his other two sons in Burma and the Spice
Islands. The East India Company's panic on the Vellore mutiny led
Carey to plan a mission to Burma, just as he had been guided to
settle in Danish Serampore ten years before. The Government of
India had doubled his salary as Bengali, Marathi, and Sanskrit
Professor, and thus had unconsciously supplied the means. Since
1795 the port of Rangoon had been opened to the British, although
Colonel Symes had been insulted eight years after, during his second
embassy to Ava. Rangoon, wrote the accurate Carey to Fuller in
November 1806, is about ten days' sail from Calcutta. "The Burman
empire is about eight hundred miles long, lying contiguous to Bengal
on the east; but is inaccessible by land, on account of the
mountains covered with thick forests which run between the two
countries. The east side of this empire borders upon China, Cochin
China, and Tongking, and may afford us the opportunity ultimately of
introducing the Gospel into those countries. They are quite within
our reach, and the Bible in Chinese will be understood by them
equally as well as by the Chinese themselves. About twenty chapters
of Matthew are translated into that language, and three of our
family have made considerable progress in it."

This was the beginning of Reformed missions to Eastern Asia. A year
was to pass before Dr. Robert Morrison landed at Macao. From those
politically aggressive and therefore opposed Jesuit missions, which
alone had worked in Anam up to this time, a persecuted bishop was
about to find an asylum at Serampore, and to use its press and its
purse for the publication of his Dictionarium Anamitico-Latinum.
The French have long sought to seize an empire there. That, at its
best, must prove far inferior to the marvellous province and
Christian Church of Burma, of which Carey laid the foundation.
Judson, and the Governors Durand, Phayre, Aitchison, and Bernard,
Henry Lawrence's nephew, built well upon it.

On 24th January 1807 Mardon and Chater went forth, after Carey had
charged them from the words, "And thence sailed to Antioch from
whence they had been recommended to the grace of God, which they
fulfilled." Carey's eldest son Felix soon took the place of Mardon.
The instructions, which bear the impress of the sacred scholar's
pen, form a model still for all missionaries. These two extracts
give counsels never more needed than now:--

"4. With respect to the Burman language, let this occupy your most
precious time and your most anxious solicitude. Do not be content
with acquiring this language superficially, but make it your own,
root and branch. To become fluent in it, you must attentivly
listen, with prying curiosity, into the forms of speech, the
construction and accent of the natives. Here all the imitative
powers are wanted; yet these powers and this attention, without
continued effort to use all you acquire, and as fast as you acquire
it, will be comparatively of little use.

"5. As soon as you shall feel your ground well in this language you
may compose a grammar, and also send us some Scripture tract, for
printing; small and plain; simple Christian instruction, and Gospel
invitation, without any thing that can irritate the most
superstitious mind.

"6. We would recommend you to begin the translation of the Gospel of
Mark as soon as possible, as one of the best and most certain ways
of acquiring the language. This translation will of course be
revised again and again. In these revisions you will be very
careful respecting the idiom and construction, that they be really
Burman, and not English. Let your instructor be well acquainted
with the language, and try every word of importance, in every way
you can, before it be admitted...

"In prosecuting this work, there are two things to which especially
we would call your very close attention, viz. the strictest and most
rigid economy, and the cultivation of brotherly love.

"Remember, that the money which you will expend is neither ours nor
yours, for it has been consecrated to God; and every unnecessary
expenditure will be robbing God, and appropriating to unnecessary
secular uses what is sacred, and consecrated to Christ and his
cause. In building, especially, remember that you are poor men, and
have chosen a life of poverty and self-denial, with Christ and his
missionary servants. If another person is profuse in expenditure,
the consequence is small, because his property would perhaps fall
into hands where it might be devoted to the purposes of iniquity;
but missionary funds are in their very circumstances the most sacred
and important of any thing of this nature on earth. We say not
this, Brethren, because we suspect you, or any of our partners in
labour; but we perceive that when you have done all, the Rangoon
mission will lie heavy upon the Missionary Funds, and the field of
exertion is very wide."

Felix Carey was a medical missionary of great skill, a printer of
the Oriental languages trained by Ward, and a scholar, especially in
Sanskrit and Pali, Bengali and Burman, not unworthy of his father.
He early commended himself to the goodwill of the Rangoon Viceroy,
and was of great use to Captain Canning in the successful mission
from the Governor-General in 1809. At his intercession the Viceroy
gave him the life of a malefactor who had hung for six hours on the
cross. Reporting the incident to Ryland, Dr. Carey wrote that
"crucifixion is not performed on separate crosses, elevated to a
considerable height, after the manner of the Romans; but several
posts are erected which are connected by a cross piece near the top,
to which the hands are nailed, and by another near the bottom, to
which the feet are nailed in a horizontal direction." He prepared a
folio dictionary of Burmese and Pali, translated several of the
Buddhist Sootras into English, and several books of Holy Scripture
into the vernacular. His medical and linguistic skill so commended
him to the king that he was loaded with honours and sent as Burmese
ambassador to the Governor-General in 1814, when he withdrew from
the Christian mission. On his way back up the Irawadi he alone was
saved from the wreck of his boat, in which his second wife and
children and the MS. of his dictionary went down. Of this his
eldest son, who "procured His Majesty's sanction for printing the
Scriptures in the Burman and adjacent languages, which step he
highly approved," and at the same time "the orders of my rank, which
consist of a red umbrella with an ivory top, gold betel box, gold
lefeek cup, and a sword of state," the father wrote lamenting to
Ryland:--"Felix is shrivelled from a missionary into an ambassador."
To his third son the sorrowing father said:--"The honours he has
received from the Burmese Government have not been beneficial to his
soul. Felix is certainly not so much esteemed since his visit as he
was before it. It is a very distressing thing to be forced to
apologise for those you love." Mr. Chater had removed to Ceylon to
begin a mission in Colombo.

In July 1813, when Felix Carey was in Ava, two young Americans,
Adoniram Judson and his wife Ann, tempest-tossed and fleeing before
the persecution of the East India Company, found shelter in the
Mission House at Rangoon. Judson was one of a band of divinity
students of the Congregational Church of New England, whose zeal had
almost compelled the institution of the American Board of Foreign
Missions. He, his wife, and colleague Rice had become Baptists by
conviction on their way to Serampore, to the brotherhood of which
they had been commended. Carey and his colleagues made it "a point
to guard against obtruding on missionary brethren of different
sentiments any conversation relative to baptism;" but Judson himself
sent a note to Carey requesting baptism by immersion. The result
was the foundation at Boston of the American Baptist Missionary
Society, which was to win such triumphs in Burma and among the
Karens. For a time, however, Judson was a missionary from
Serampore, and supported by the brotherhood. As such he wrote
thus:--

"RANGOON, Sept. 1, 1814.--Brother Ward wishes to have an idea of the
probable expense of each station; on which I take occasion to say
that it would be more gratifying to me, as presenting a less
temptation, and as less dangerous to my habits of economy and my
spiritual welfare, to have a limited monthly allowance. I fear
that, if I am allowed as much as I want, my wants will enlarge with
their gratification, and finally embrace many things, which at first
I should have thought incompatible with economical management, as
well as with that character among the heathen which it becomes the
professed followers of Him who for our sakes became poor, even to
sustain. It is better for a missionary, especially a young man, to
have rather too little than rather too much. Your case, on coming
out from England, was quite different from mine. You had all that
there was, and were obliged to make the most of it.

"If these things meet the ideas of the brethren, I will be obliged
to them to say, what sum, in Sicca Rupees, payable in Bengal, they
think sufficient for a small family in Rangoon--sufficient to meet
all common expenses, and indeed all that will be incurred at
present, except that of passages by sea. You have all the accounts
before you, especially of things purchased in Bengal, which I have
not; and from having seen the mission pass through various changes,
will be more competent to make an estimate of expense than I am.
And while you are making this estimate for one family, say also
what will be sufficient for two small families, so that if Brother
Rice, or any other should soon join me, it may not be necessary to
bring the subject again under consideration. This sum I will
receive under the same regulations as other stations are subject to,
and which I heartily approve. And if, on experiment, it be found
much too large, I shall be as glad to diminish it, as to have you
increase it, if it be found much too small.

"Sept. 7.--Since writing the above, we have received the distressing
intelligence, that a few days after Mr. Carey left us, and soon
after he had reached the brig (which had previously gone into the
great river) on the 31st of August, about noon, she was overtaken by
a squall of wind, upset, and instantly sunk. Those who could swim,
escaped with their lives merely, and those who could not, perished.
Among the saved, were Mr. Carey and most of the Bengalees. Mrs.
Carey, the two children, her women and girls, and several men--in
all, ten persons, perished. Every article of property had been
transferred from the boats to the vessel, and she had just left the
place, where she had been long waiting the arrival of Mr. Carey, and
had been under sail about three hours. Several boats were not far
distant; the gold-boat was within sight, but so instantaneous was
the disaster, that not a single thing was saved. Some attempts were
made by the lascars to save Mrs. Carey and William, but they were
unsuccessful. Mr. Carey staid on the shore through the following
night; a neighbouring governor sent him clothes and money; and the
next morning he took the gold-boat, and proceeded up the river. A
large boat, on which were several servants, men and women, beside
those that were in the vessel, followed the gold-boat. The jolly
boat has returned here, bringing the surviving lascars.

"The dreadful situation to which our poor brother was thus reduced
in a moment, from the height of prosperity, fills our minds
continually with the greatest distress. We are utterly unable to
afford him the least relief, and can only pray that this awful
dispensation may prove a paternal chastisement from his Heavenly
Father, and be sanctified to his soul."

While Judson wrote to Serampore, which he once again visited,
leaving the dust of a child in the mission burial-ground, "I am glad
to hear you say that you will not abandon this mission," Carey
pressed on to the "regions beyond." Judson lived till 1850 to found
a church and to prepare a Burmese dictionary, grammar, and
translation of the Bible so perfect that revision has hardly been
necessary up to the present day. He and Hough, a printer who joined
him, formed themselves into a brotherhood on the same self-denying
principles as that of Serampore, whom they besought to send them
frequent communications to counsel, strengthen, and encourage them.
On 28th September 1814 Judson again wrote to Carey from Rangoon:--

"DEAR BROTHER CAREY--If copies of Colebrooke's Sungskrita
Dictionary, and your Sungskrita Grammar are not too scarce, I
earnestly request a copy of each. I find it will be absolutely
necessary for me to pick up a little of the Pali, chiefly on account
of many theological terms, which have been incorporated from that
language into the Burman. I have found a dictionary, which I
suppose is the same as that which Mr. Colebrooke translated, adapted
to the Burman system. This I intend to read. I want also Leyden's
Vocabulary, and a copy or two of your son's grammar, when it is
completed. I gave your son on his going up to Ava, my copy of
Campbell's Gospels, together with several other books, all of which
are now lost. The former I chiefly regret, and know not whence I
can procure another copy.

"There is a vessel now lying here, which is destined to take round
an Ambassador from this Government to Bengal. He expects to go in
about a month, as he told me. He is now waiting for final
instructions from Ava. If Felix be really to be sent to Bengal
again, I think it most probable that he will be ordered to accompany
this ambassador.

"Mrs. J. was on the point of taking passage with Captain Hitchins,
to obtain some medical advice in Bengal; but she has been a little
better for a few days, and has given up the plan for the present.
This is a delightful climate. We have now seen all the seasons,
and can therefore judge. The hot weather in March and April is the
chief exception. Nature has done everything for this country; and
the Government is very indulgent to all foreigners. When we see how
we are distinguished above all around, even in point of worldly
comforts, we feel that we want gratitude. O that we may be faithful
in the improvement of every mercy, and patient under every trial
which God may have in store for us. We know not how the Gospel can
ever be introduced here: everything, in this respect, appears as
dark as midnight."

By 1816 Judson had prepared the Gospel of Matthew in Burmese,
following up short tracts "accommodated to the optics of a Burman."

Carey's third son Jabez was clerk to a Calcutta attorney at the
time, in 1812, when Dr. Ryland preached in the Dutch Church, Austin
Friars, the anniversary sermon on the occasion of the removal of the
headquarters of the Society to London. Pausing in the midst of his
discourse, after a reference to Carey, the preacher called on the
vast congregation silently to pray for the conversion of Jabez
Carey. The answer came next year in a letter from his father:--"My
son Jabez, who has been articled to an attorney, and has the fairest
prospects as to this world, is become decidedly religious, and
prefers the work of the Lord to every other." Lord Minto's
expeditions of 1810 and 1811 had captured the islands swept by the
French privateers from Madagascar to Java, and there was soon an end
of the active hostility of the authorities to Christianity. Sir
Stamford Raffles governed Java in the spirit of a Christian
statesman. The new Governor-General, Lord Moira, afterwards Marquis
of Hastings, proved to be the most enlightened and powerful friend
the mission had had. In these circumstances, after the charter of
1813 had removed the legislative excuse for intolerance, Dr. Carey
was asked by the Lieutenant-Governor to send missionaries and Malay
Bibles to the fifty thousand natives of Amboyna. The
Governor-General repeated the request officially. Jabez Carey was
baptised, married, and despatched at the cost of the state before he
could be ordained. Amboyna, it will be perceived, was not in India,
but far enough away to give the still timid Company little
apprehension as to the influence of the missionaries there. The
father's heart was very full when he sent forth the son:--

"24th January 1814.--You are now engaging in a most important
undertaking, in which not only you will have our prayers for your
success, but those of all who love our Lord Jesus Christ, and who
know of your engagement. I know that a few hints for your future
conduct from a parent who loves you very tenderly will be
acceptable, and I shall therefore now give you them, assured that
they will not be given in vain.

"1st. Pay the utmost attention at all times to the state of your own
mind both towards God and man: cultivate an intimate acquaintance
with your own heart; labour to obtain a deep sense of your depravity
and to trust always in Christ; be pure in heart, and meditate much
upon the pure and holy character of God; live a life of prayer and
devotedness to God; cherish every amiable and right disposition
towards men; be mild, gentle, and unassuming, yet firm and manly.
As soon as you perceive anything wrong in your spirit or behaviour
set about correcting it, and never suppose yourself so perfect as to
need no correction.

"2nd. You are now a married man, be not satisfied with conducting
yourself towards your wife with propriety, but let love to her be
the spring of your conduct towards her. Esteem her highly, and so
act that she may be induced thereby to esteem you highly. The first
impressions of love arising from form and beauty will soon wear off,
but the esteem arising from excellency of disposition and substance
of character will endure and increase. Her honour is now yours, and
she cannot be insulted without your being degraded. I hope as soon
as you get on board, and are settled in your cabin, you will begin
and end each day by uniting together to pray and praise God. Let
religion always have a place in your house. If the Lord bless you
with children, bring them up in the fear of God, and be always an
example to others of the power of godliness. This advice I give
also to Eliza, and if it is followed you will be happy.

"3rd. Behave affably and genteelly to all, but not cringingly
towards any. Feel that you are a man, and always act with that
dignified sincerity and truth which will command the esteem of all.
Seek not the society of worldly men, but when called to be with
them act and converse with propriety and dignity. To do this labour
to gain a good acquaintance with history, geography, men, and
things. A gentleman is the next best character after a Christian,
and the latter includes the former. Money never makes a gentleman,
neither does a fine appearance, but an enlarged understanding joined
to engaging manners.

"4th. On your arrival at Amboyna your first business must be to wait
on Mr. Martin. You should first send a note to inform him of your
arrival, and to inquire when it will suit him to receive you. Ask
his advice upon every occasion of importance, and communicate freely
to him all the steps you take.

"5th. As soon as you are settled begin your work. Get a Malay who
can speak a little English, and with him make a tour of the island,
and visit every school. Encourage all you see worthy of
encouragement, and correct with mildness, yet with firmness. Keep a
journal of the transactions of the schools, and enter each one under
a distinct head therein. Take account of the number of scholars,
the names of the schoolmasters, compare their progress at stated
periods, and, in short, consider this as the work which the Lord has
given you to do.

"6th. Do not, however, consider yourself as a mere superintendent of
schools; consider yourself as the spiritual instructor of the
people, and devote yourself to their good. God has committed the
spiritual interests of this island--20,000 men or more--to you; a
vast charge, but He can enable you to be faithful to it. Revise the
catechism, tracts, and school-books used among them, and labour to
introduce among them sound doctrine and genuine piety. Pray with
them as soon as you can, and labour after a gift to preach to them.
I expect you will have much to do with them respecting baptism.
They all think infant sprinkling right, and will apply to you to
baptise their children; you must say little till you know something
of the language, and then prove to them from Scripture what is the
right mode of baptism and who are the proper persons to be baptised.
Form them into Gospel churches when you meet with a few who truly
fear God; and as soon as you see any fit to preach to others, call
them to the ministry and settle them with the churches. You must
baptise and administer the Lord's Supper according to your own
discretion when there is a proper occasion for it. Avoid indolence
and love of ease, and never attempt to act the part of the great and
gay in this world.

"7th. Labour incessantly to become a perfect master of the Malay
language. In order to this, associate with the natives, walk out
with them, ask the name of everything you see, and note it down;
visit their houses, especially when any of them are sick. Every
night arrange the words you get in alphabetical order. Try to talk
as soon as you get a few words, and be as much as possible one of
them. A course of kind and attentive conduct will gain their esteem
and confidence and give you an opportunity of doing much good.

"8th. You will soon learn from Mr. Martin the situation and
disposition of the Alfoors or aboriginal inhabitants, and will see
what can be done for them. Do not unnecessarily expose your life,
but incessantly contrive some way of giving them the word of life.

"9th. I come now to things of inferior importance, but which I hope
you will not neglect. I wish you to learn correctly the number,
size, and geography of the islands; the number and description of
inhabitants; their customs and manners, and everything of note
relative to them; and regularly communicate these things to me.

"Your great work, my dear Jabez, is that of a Christian minister.
You would have been solemnly set apart thereto if you could have
stayed long enough to have permitted it. The success of your
labours does not depend upon an outward ceremony, nor does your
right to preach the Gospel or administer the ordinances of the
Gospel depend on any such thing, but only on the Divine call
expressed in the Word of God. The Church has, however, in their
intentions and wishes borne a testimony to the grace given to you,
and will not cease to pray for you that you may be successful. May
you be kept from all temptations, supported under every trial, made
victorious in every conflict; and may our hearts be mutually
gladdened with accounts from each other of the triumphs of Divine
grace. God has conferred a great favour upon you in committing to
you this ministry. Take heed to it therefore in the Lord that thou
fulfil it. We shall often meet at the throne of grace. Write me by
every opportunity, and tell Eliza to write to your mother.

"Now, my dear Jabez, I commit you both to God, and to the word of
His grace, which is able to make you perfect in the knowledge of His
will. Let that word be near your heart. I give you both up to God,
and should I never more see you on earth I trust we shall meet with
joy before His throne of glory at last."

Under both the English and the Dutch for a time, to whom the island
was restored, Jabez Carey proved to be a successful missionary,
while he supported the mission by his official income as
superintendent of schools and second member of the College of
Justice. The island contained 18,000 native Christians of the Dutch
compulsory type, such as we found in Ceylon on taking it over. Thus
by the labours of himself, his sons, his colleagues, and his
children in the faith, William Carey saw the Gospel, the press, and
the influence of a divine philanthropy extending among Mohammedans,
Buddhists, and Hindoos, from the shores of the Pacific Ocean west to
the Arabian Sea.





CHAPTER VIII

CAREY'S FAMILY AND FRIENDS

1807-1812

The type of a Christian gentleman--Carey and his first wife--His
second marriage--The Lady Rumohr--His picture of their married
life--His nearly fatal illness when forty-eight years old--His
meditations and dreams--Aldeen House--Henry Martyn's pagoda--Carey,
Marshman, and the Anglican chaplains in the pagoda--Corrie's account
of the Serampore Brotherhood--Claudius Buchanan and his Anglican
establishment--Improvement in Anglo-Indian Society--Carey's literary
and scientific friends--Desire in the West for a likeness of
Carey--Home's portrait of him--Correspondence with his son William
on missionary consecration, Buonaparte, botany, the missionary a
soldier, Felix and Burma, hunting, the temporal power of the Pope,
the duty of reconciliation--Carey's descendants.

"A Gentleman is the next best character after a Christian, and the
latter includes the former," were the father's words to the son whom
he was sending forth as a Christian missionary and state
superintendent of schools. Carey wrote from his own experience, and
he unwittingly painted his own character. The peasant bearing of
his early youth showed itself throughout his life in a certain
shyness, which gave a charm to his converse with old and young.
Occasionally, as in a letter which he wrote to his friend Pearce of
Birmingham, at a time when he did not know whether his distant
correspondent was alive or dead, he burst forth into an unrestrained
enthusiasm of affection and service. But his was rather the even
tenor of domestic devotion and friendly duty, unbroken by passion or
coldness, and ever lighted up by a steady geniality. The colleagues
who were associated with him for the third of a century worshipped
him in the old English sense of the word. The younger committee-men
and missionaries who came to the front on the death of Fuller,
Sutcliff, and Ryland, in all their mistaken conflicts with these
colleagues, always tried to separate Carey from those they
denounced, till even his saintly spirit burst forth into wrath at
the double wrong thus done to his coadjutors. His intercourse with
the chaplains and bishops of the Church of England, and with the
missionaries of other Churches and societies, was as loving in its
degree as his relations to his own people. With men of the world,
from the successive Governor-Generals, from Wellesley, Hastings, and
Bentinck, down to the scholars, merchants, and planters with whom he
became associated for the public good, William Carey was ever the
saint and the gentleman whom it was a privilege to know.

In nothing perhaps was Carey's true Christian gentlemanliness so
seen as in his relations with his first wife, above whom grace and
culture had immeasurably raised him, while she never learned to
share his aspirations or to understand his ideals. Not only did she
remain to the last a peasant woman, with a reproachful tongue, but
the early hardships of Calcutta and the fever and dysentery of
Mudnabati clouded the last twelve years of her life with madness.
Never did reproach or complaint escape his lips regarding either
her or Thomas, whose eccentric impulses and oft-darkened spirit were
due to mania also. Of both he was the tender nurse and guardian
when, many a time, the ever-busy scholar would fain have lingered at
his desk or sought the scanty sleep which his jealous devotion to
his Master's business allowed him. The brotherhood arrangement, the
common family, Ward's influence over the boys, and Hannah Marshman's
housekeeping relieved him of much that his wife's illness had thrown
upon him at Mudnabati, so that a colleague describes him, when he
was forty-three years of age, as still looking young in spite of the
few hairs on his head, after eleven years in Lower Bengal of work
such as never Englishman had before him. But almost from the first
day of his early married life he had never known the delight of
daily converse with a wife able to enter into his scholarly
pursuits, and ever to stimulate him in his heavenly quest. When the
eldest boy, Felix, had left for Burma in 1807 the faithful sorrowing
husband wrote to him:--"Your poor mother grew worse and worse from
the time you left us, and died on the 7th December about seven
o'clock in the evening. During her illness she was almost always
asleep, and I suppose during the fourteen days that she lay in a
severe fever she was not more than twenty-four hours awake. She was
buried the next day in the missionary burying-ground."

About the same time that Carey himself settled in Serampore there
arrived the Lady Rumohr. She built a house on the Hoogli bank
immediately below that of the missionaries, whose society she
sought, and by whom she was baptised. On the 9th May 1808 she
became Carey's wife; and in May 1821 she too was removed by death in
her sixty-first year, after thirteen years of unbroken happiness.

Charlotte Emilia, born in the same year as Carey in the then Danish
duchy of Schleswick, was the only child of the Chevalier de Rumohr,
who married the Countess of Alfeldt, only representative of a
historic family. Her wakefulness when a sickly girl of fifteen
saved the whole household from destruction by fire, but she herself
became so disabled that she could never walk up or down stairs. She
failed to find complete recovery in the south of Europe, and her
father's friend, Mr. Anker, a director of the Danish East India
Company, gave her letters to his brother, then Governor of
Tranquebar, in the hope that the climate of India might cause her
relief. The Danish ship brought her first to Serampore, where
Colonel Bie introduced her to the brotherhood, and there she
resolved to remain. She knew the principal languages of Europe; a
copy of the Pensées of Pascal, given to her by Mr. Anker before she
sailed, for the first time quickened her conscience. She speedily
learned English, that she might join the missionaries in public
worship. The barren orthodoxy of the Lutheranism in which she had
been brought up had made her a sceptic. This soon gave way to the
evangelical teaching of the same apostle who had brought Luther
himself to Christ. She became a keen student of the Scriptures,
then an ardent follower of Jesus Christ.

On her marriage to Dr. Carey, in May 1808, she made over her house
to the mission, and when, long after, it became famous as the office
of the weekly Friend of India, the rent was sacredly devoted to the
assistance of native preachers. She learned Bengali that she might
be as a mother to the native Christian families. She was her
husband's counsellor in all that related to the extension of the
varied enterprise of the brethren. Especially did she make the
education of Hindoo girls her own charge, both at Serampore and
Cutwa. Her leisure she gave to the reading of French Protestant
writers, such as Saurin and Du Moulin. She admired, wrote Carey,
"Massillon's language, his deep knowledge of the human heart, and
his intrepidity in reproving sin; but felt the greatest
dissatisfaction with his total neglect of his Saviour, except when
He is introduced to give efficacy to works of human merit. These
authors she read in their native language, that being more familiar
to her than English. She in general enjoyed much of the
consolations of religion. Though so much afflicted, a pleasing
cheerfulness generally pervaded her conversation. She indeed
possessed great activity of mind. She was constantly out with the
dawn of the morning when the weather permitted, in her little
carriage drawn by one bearer; and again in the evening, as soon as
the sun was sufficiently low. She thus spent daily nearly three
hours in the open air. It was probably this vigorous and regular
course which, as the means, carried her beyond the age of threescore
years (twenty-one of them spent in India), notwithstanding the
weakness of her constitution."

It is a pretty picture, the delicate invalid lady, drawn along the
mall morning and evening, to enjoy the river breeze, on her way to
and from the schools and homes of the natives. But her highest
service was, after all, to her husband, who was doing a work for
India and for humanity, equalled by few, if any. When, on one
occasion, they were separated for a time while she sought for health
at Monghyr, she wrote to him the tenderest yet most courtly
love-letters.

"MY DEAREST LOVE,--I felt very much in parting with thee, and feel
much in being so far from thee...I am sure thou wilt be happy and
thankful on account of my voice, which is daily getting better, and
thy pleasure greatly adds to mine own.

"I hope you will not think I am writing too often; I rather trust
you will be glad to hear of me...Though my journey is very pleasant,
and the good state of my health, the freshness of the air, and the
variety of objects enliven my spirits, yet I cannot help longing for
you. Pray, my love, take care of your health that I may have the
joy to find you well.

"I thank thee most affectionately, my dearest love, for thy kind
letter. Though the journey is very useful to me, I cannot help
feeling much to be so distant from you, but I am much with you in my
thoughts...The Lord be blessed for the kind protection He has given
to His cause in a time of need. May He still protect and guide and
bless His dear cause, and give us all hearts growing in love and
zeal...I felt very much affected in parting with thee. I see
plainly it would not do to go far from you; my heart cleaves to you.
I need not say (for I hope you know my heart is not insensible) how
much I feel your kindness in not minding any expense for the
recovery of my health. You will rejoice to hear me talk in my old
way, and not in that whispering manner.

"I find so much pleasure in writing to you, my love, that I cannot
help doing it. I was nearly disconcerted by Mrs.--laughing at my
writing so often; but then, I thought, I feel so much pleasure in
receiving your letters that I may hope you do the same. I thank
thee, my love, for thy kind letter. I need not say that the serious
part of it was welcome to me, and the more as I am deprived of all
religious intercourse...I shall greatly rejoice, my love, in seeing
thee again; but take care of your health that I may find you well.
I need not say how much you are in my thoughts day and night."

His narrative of their intercourse, written after her death, lets in
a flood of light on his home life:--

"During the thirteen years of her union with Dr. Carey, they had


 


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